Wilde Card: Immortal Vegas, Book 2 (31 page)

“I, um, got run off the road earlier.” Simon huffed out a breath. “I haven’t been able to get my vehicle started.”

“Is that why you’re on the roof, sir? Wearing that helmet?” The officer’s voice sounded pained, and he took another step forward. “If you can’t remove your vehicle you’ll be cited and it will be tow—“

In an elegant, flowing motion, the death mask closest to the officer turned, drawing his arm down in a graceful arc.

The cop hit the pavement, out cold.

“What the—” I dropped into a squat and crawled over to the police officer. He was breathing, with no apparent injuries, his heartbeat steady. He was actually…snoring.

I squinted up at Simon as he hopped off the roof of the truck and landed lightly on the ground. “He’s not dead.”

“Of course he’s not dead. They were protecting me.”

Was it my imagination, or did Simon’s chest look a little fuller now? He pulled off the helmet, sighing. “But really and truly, I can’t accept this. You’ll need to find a…um…”

The creatures were kneeling. Now to anyone walking by, Simon was holding a helmet and staring at a crowd of supplicants, while a passed-out cop lay at his feet. That couldn’t be good. Simon frowned at Armaeus. “Do you speak, ah, Mongolian?”

The creatures lowered farther, and a soft, murmuring chant lifted around us, ethereal and eerie.

Armaeus folded his arms. “It appears they are pledging fealty to you, Simon. They do not want to return to their homeland. They want to follow you to yours.”

“Mine! What am I going to do with a posse of undead?”

“Anything you would like, it would appear.”

Simon frowned, looking from the men to his helmet. “What if they’re assholes?”

“Every friendship has its challenges.”

Simon sighed. “Fine. Tell them I—”

Before he could get the words out, the creatures lifted their arms and backed away, bowing.

My head started to hurt. “What in the…”

At Simon’s feet, the cop was stirring. Simon set the helmet into the truck’s bed, then squatted down. “Officer? Officer! Are you all right?” he shouted loudly. “Do you need me to call an ambulance?”

Armaeus drew me away. “I think Simon will be able to manage from here.”

“But the—”

Armaeus gestured almost lazily to the street. Standing at the curb were thirteen men, lined up at attention. Their bronzed skin linked them, some of them as young as Simon, some old, with whisper-white hair and deep furrows bracketing their eyes and mouths. They wore long, brightly colored tunics over dark loose pants, and they watched Simon without speaking, their gaze intent, their smiles wide. None of their masks were in evidence. Still, even in Vegas, they stood out. “Seriously? They’re human now?”

He eyed me. “They were never anything but. The abilities of the human race exceed modern imagination, but not that of the ancient seers. You, out of everyone, should know that.”

“I guess.” We were walking past the Bellagio again, where the enormous claw marks were—

Armaeus waved his hand.

—magically gone.

“You get off on doing that, don’t you?”

“People see what they expect to see, Miss Wilde.”

I stared at the dancing fountains, and at the empty hole above the grand casino, where a fairy-tale castle once stood. And blinked again. The castle was gone, yes. But the space wasn’t empty. An enormous glittering glass foolscap soared above the Bellagio now, shimmering in the spray of the fountains.

I grinned in spite of it all. “That was fast.”

“An improvement, I should say.”

I couldn’t argue. Especially since the place would be populated by sort-of almost real live people. “So, now you need a new Empress?”

I sensed him glance toward me. “Are you interested in the position?”

“That would be negative. Getting benched seems pretty extreme.”

“What happened to Roxie is not common and was brought about by her own hand.”

“Yeah, no.” I waved him off. “I’m good. But that gets you down to…what, five? You, Kreios, Simon, Eshe—and the Emperor, right?” I swiveled my gaze to the grey stone castle above Caesars. Like the Empress’s palace, I’d never seen any sign of life there. “Does he ever come out of his hole?”

“I suspect he will shortly.” It was impossible to read Armaeus’s tone. It was neutral, almost bored. But I’d been around him long enough to find that worrisome. “The Council has but one governing rule, Miss Wilde, beyond the balance of magic. And that is not to weaken the Council. Roxie sought to do that. Whether out of malice or spite or simply because she thought she might gain power because of it, does not matter.”

“And…what, the Emperor did that too?”

“No.” Armaeus shook his head. “The Emperor is, perhaps more than any of us, dedicated to the balance of dark and light magic.”

The dots connected all on their own. “He’s the dark, isn’t he?” I stared at the monolith. “That’s why you don’t want him here. Roxie was dark too. Eshe, for all her bitch face, is neutral. Kreios is dark, but sort of like chocolate is dark. ” I frowned at him. “What are you?”

“None and all. As head of the Council, that is my lot.”

“Somebody’s gotta do it, I guess. And Simon?”

“Light.” Armaeus’s mouth twitched into a tired smile.

“So with Roxie gone, you’re out of balance. You’re going to need to add some true darkness of some kind.”

“The balance does not have to be exact. Roxie was not that dark. She was vain and petty, but her augmented magic was strong. The evil did not outweigh the good that she wrought until the very end.”

“Okay, but who else is out there? Death, the Hierophant, Hanged Man, Hermit? Maybe Justice, if you want to get technical about it. The rest…I don’t see as people, so much. The Lovers, I suppose. But that’s two people, right?”

I thought about the robed shadow that had flickered in the maelstrom. “Who’s seated currently, and what holes do you need to fill?”

Armaeus didn’t answer, and silence stretched between us. Eventually, we reached the Luxor, and I stared up at Prime Luxe soaring above it, all metal and crystal and fierceness. It suddenly occurred to me that I didn’t live there. My home was at the Palazzo at the other end of the Strip. And that wasn’t really a home either, I supposed. It was… I didn’t know what it was, suddenly.

Time to go.
“Well, have a good evening. It’s been fun.”

Armaeus turned to me. His eyes continued to glow with that eerie half-light. “Are you sure I can’t tempt you to continue our conversation?”

I thought about Nikki. Hopefully the cops had taken her to the hospital, where she was being tended to by strapping young doctors. I thought about Simon and his baker’s dozen of personal guards, turning on all the lights in the Foolscap. I thought about Brody and Dixie—leaving together, both of them aglow with the surge of power that Armaeus had fed into them.

“How long will it last?” I asked again, shoving my hands into the pockets of my hoodie and nudging the now dormant scroll case. “The augmentation, I mean. The power surge. How long until everyone goes back to normal?”

He glanced back down the Strip. “The effects will vary. For the Connecteds with at least moderate innate ability, it could last several days. For those unfortunate enough to be at SANCTUS headquarters when you threw the scroll case at the screen, the effect will likely last far longer.”

“Yeah, well. They had it coming.”

Armaeus’s lips twitched. “With today’s actions, SANCTUS will be in disarray. Some will not be able to handle their newfound psychic abilities. Some will far better than they would prefer.”

“Which makes them like the rest of us. And the people here in Vegas?”

“Impossible to tell.”

“Right.” I thought a little bit more about Brody and Dixie. I glanced again at the spires of Prime Luxe.

“My offer to extend our conversation stands, Miss Wilde,” Armaeus said quietly. “I assure you, I only wish to talk.”

I nodded. “I could use a good talk right about now.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

The Magician’s penthouse living room was bathed in soft light when we reached it, the dim glow accentuating the magnificent view of the Strip. He crossed to the bar, and the familiar sound of thick-cut crystal glasses clinking together should have helped unwind me. Instead, it kicked me up another notch. I pulled the scroll case out of my hoodie and set it carefully on one of Armaeus’s shelves.

“Miss Wilde?”

I turned, and Armaeus was beside me. His eyes now practically gleamed with the unholy fire of the power surging through him. He handed me the scotch, and I took it, taking a sharp swallow.

“Kreios was unaffected, right?” I asked. “He seemed pretty much normal, anyway. What about Eshe?”

“Eshe was in deep meditation at the time. She knew the confrontation was coming, and she wanted to take advantage of it in her own way. She seeks to maintain her hold on the enhancement long enough to undertake her own oracular attempt—not solely to be able to guide someone like you and interpret what you see, but to view the world with her own eyes. If she can reach a transcendent state to seek out the answers she craves, she will no longer need intermediaries. As to Kreios, yes. He appeared unfazed by the blast. That bears further study. He was also unsurprised that he was not affected, which, frankly, is more curious still.”

“He’s psychically deaf?” He’d said something about that after the Rarity attack, but was it true?

Armaeus wasn’t convinced either. “Or so he would prefer us to believe.” He rolled his glass in his hand. “The Fool was unaffected because he was protected by the Mongolian crown.”

“What about me?” I couldn’t help but ask. “Because I sure as hell felt it when the pulse was set to ‘pulverize,’ and, obviously, I was pumped up enough to hold that scroll case without singeing my skin off. But I don’t feel different now.”

“It’s a very good question.” Armaeus set down his glass, untouched, and took mine from my hand. He tilted my face up to the light. “Your eyes remain the same. Your energy does not appear to be affected.”

“Oh?” I struggled to keep my voice steady. It’d been a long day.

“No.” He drew his fingers along my chin, the pressure sending excited whorls of sensation skittering along my nerves. I knew he was aware of my physical reaction, but for once, he disregarded it. “You spoke directly to Llyr, which was very dangerous, and quite foolish.”

“Llyr.” I repeated the name. “You knew I was looking for him all this time, didn’t you?”

“Not until you brought his image to me scrawled on a bar receipt.” His gaze met mine. “As I said then, there has never been a Council airplane with Llyr’s symbol inscribed on it. We have done our level best to eradicate all imagery related to it.”

I stared. “But I saw it—“

“Yes. Which shouldn’t have been possible. The fact that you did is another piece of the mystery in which you are mired, Miss Wilde.” He paused, letting the moment play out. “You saw him long ago, as well, I suspect. The day you left Memphis.”

I met Armaeus’s gaze, knowing what he wanted. Though he’d been responsible for bringing the Connecteds into harm’s way, that hadn’t technically voided our deal. Our deal had been that, if he helped me
protect
the Connecteds, I was to give him a piece of my mind. Literally.

But now I wanted that too. Whether it was the influx of power or the adrenaline from a job well done, the idea of exploring my past didn’t bother me at this precise moment. I needed to know, to understand. And Armaeus could help me.

“How long would it take?”

He shifted closer to me. “But an instant. I swear that would be all that I need.”

“Fi—” Armaeus bent toward me before I could finish the word, and covered my mouth with his. Instantly, my mind shuddered and balked, the scene racing before me ripped whole cloth from the fabric of my past. Breakfast alone at the table. The note, the touch of wrongness on its page. The surge of fear, of needing to run, to escape, to fly—the race to get out of the house and into the yard, falling, running, slipping, until everything went up in a surge of smoke and fire and sound—all around me. And then I saw—I saw…

Armaeus broke away, and I sucked in a huge breath, swaying in his arms. He scowled down at me, his face like stone, and a surge of all that leftover grief and fear and rage welled up within me, so strong I nearly choked on it.

“What?” I gasped, searching his eyes. “What?”

Armaeus blinked, then apparently could truly see me again. An emotion I’d never seen before crossed his face. It was almost…tender. Full of wonder.

Annnnnd… Something inside me broke.

“Kiss me again, Armaeus,” I whispered before I could stop myself. “Now, before all the pain returns. The questions. I want more. I want it all.”

He went very still. “You’re not yourself.”

“Aren’t I?” I stood up on my tiptoes and brushed my lips against his. There was no fear this time, no wall of self-preserving terror. Instead, I needed the Magician, more than I’d needed anything in my life. Needed Armaeus’s hands on me, his mouth on mine, his heat surrounding me. Needed something to penetrate to the icy-cold core of my emotions and thaw the pain that was gnawing at me, turning me dead inside. “Please.”

Armaeus’s war with himself took about three point five seconds. “I will do this because it is pleasure, and healing, and pleasure and healing are what you most need.”

That sounded conditional, and I wasn’t about conditional. But as Armaeus dragged me into a rough embrace, I didn’t care. With a swipe of his leg, my knees buckled and I fell to the floor, his body covering mine as he ground me into the thick carpet. And his mouth was everywhere. On my mouth, my temple, down the curve of my neck. His fingers tangled in my hair, pulling my head back, exposing my collarbone to his questing lips. My back arched instinctively beneath him. He brought his left hand around and pushed my tank top up high on my chest. Then breath hissed from my lips as his fingers closed around the weight of my breast, kneading it, rolling the nipple in his hard fingers, teasing with both pleasure and pain.

“Yes,” I moaned. “Yes—that. Please.” I strained toward him. His mouth met mine, and I drank him in, surrounded by his heat. Power shot through me, exotic and sure, filling me up.